


Lab Partners

by thedevilchicken



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Getting Together, M/M, Tony Stark Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:54:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25117963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: Tony asks Scott for some help in the lab. Scott's pretty sure he doesn't need help at all.
Relationships: Scott Lang/Tony Stark
Comments: 6
Kudos: 61
Collections: Little Black Dress Exchange 2020





	Lab Partners

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SkyRose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkyRose/gifts).



"Hey, Bugman," Tony said, one bright and sunny afternoon in the more-or-less newly rebuilt Avengers compound. He was leaning against the wall by the kitchen door, playing with his phone, so totally glued to whatever exciting, important thing he was doing that he didn't even look up when he spoke. "I could use some help in the lab." Then he turned and disappeared down the corridor, like Scott following him was a foregone conclusion. 

He'd like to think it wasn't, but the fact is he did go after him. He'd like to think he went mostly 'cause he was curious about The Lab and the kind of stuff Tony threw together down there on all those long, late nights. He'd spent some time with Hank and Hope and Janet, watching Science Happen, and he was pretty sure whatever Tony did was either more interesting than that or more entirely fueled by caffeine and given the fact he'd woken up roughly forty seconds earlier, coffee or the tech equivalent of Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory was pretty much what he required. 

Forty minutes later, he still hadn't gotten that coffee. And maybe he'd brushed his teeth before he'd left his room but he definitely hadn't brushed his hair and he was wearing a welding mask and a pair of gloves that looked like something out of a medieval forge. Tony was the one doing the welding; Scott's job was holding the contraption still. 

"Hey, is there a reason you're hand-making an Iron Man suit the size of a six year old?" Scott asked. 

Tony killed the torch and lifted his mask. "What if I said it's for Morgan's birthday?" he replied.

"I'd say most of us would just buy rollerskates or something, not a suit you can fly into space."

"You think I'm trying too hard." Scott gave him a look, which he realized wasn't totally effective with his mask still on, so he took it off and did it again. Tony groaned. He rubbed his face. "Yeah, I know, I'm trying too hard." Then he wandered off again, almost like Scott wasn't even there. 

The next time Scott went down to the lab was a couple of days later, after a brief brush with a Doombot or six; Tony blasted them from the sky and Scott stomped on them while he was the size of a department store, which turned out to be highly effective as far as teamwork went. Then, when they got back to the compound, Tony had F.R.I.D.A.Y. page him to the lab. Scott, like he had nothing better to do - which was kinda true, if you didn't count munching his way through a whole pack of energy bars - made his way down. 

"Are those meant to be rollerskates?" he asked. Tony was lying flat on his back on the floor; Scott went closer and squatted by his feet, which were sporting the offending items. He frowned. "Because you know, those look a lot like rollerskates." 

"Yeah, well, maybe it turns out it's easier to fly than skate," Tony said. 

"So you fell. There's something you weren't immediately good at?"

"I can neither confirm nor deny."

Scott reached out a hand and Tony took it, but that didn't mean what happened next went well because it absolutely didn't: they wound up in a heap on the floor of Tony's lab, Tony barely an inch from where he'd started out except Scott was sprawled on top of him. Tony raised his eyebrows. Scott did a thing with his face that both was and wasn't smiling. And eventually, Scott actually managed to pull Tony to his feet. 

"Hey, make me a pair of those and I'll teach you to skate," Scott said. 

Tony eyed him skeptically. But the next time F.R.I.D.A.Y. relayed the invitation to join Tony in the lab, there was a pair of matching skates for him; they were red and gold, just like the suit, made of nanotech that popped out from nowhere. Scott was pretty sure the fact he could shrink to the size of an ant would come in handy the first twenty or so times he managed to lose them.

Tony turned out to be the run-before-you-walk type who fell on his ass twenty times before he let Scott try to teach him, and the I-know-better-than-you type who didn't listen when Scott tried to teach. The next time they skated after that, Tony had Morgan for the weekend and boy, was she about ten times better at it than her dad was. And later, while Morgan was napping on the couch, Tony took Scott down to the lab. 

"Look, I don't believe for a second I'm actually _helping_ you," Scott said. "I'm like 95% less effective than the robot that keeps spilling your drink." 

"I mean, you've never actually spilled my drink," Tony replied. He shrugged. "That makes you at least 2% less annoying than Dum-E." Of course, Scott had to admit that didn't make him feel a whole lot better, but then the robot in question apparently decided Tony's welding torch was a fire risk and doused them both in foam. At least he'd never done that.

In the lab's pseudo-emergency shower, which was nicer than the bathroom in some if not all of the places Scott had lived, Scott sluiced off the foam and glanced sidelong at Tony. "I'm pretty sure you brought me down here under false pretences," he said, while totally not checking him out. 

Tony tilted his head. "Which time?" he asked.

"All of them?" Scott shrugged. "You know you can just ask if you have so-I-have-a-daughter, I-hear-you-have-one-too kinds of questions, right? Divorced dad to divorced dad. You don't need to dress it up."

"What, you don't appreciate the scenic route?"

"You call this scenic?"

Tony grinned. He wiggled his eyebrows. "It looks pretty good from where I'm standing," he said.

Scott laughed and turned his attention back to the fire-retardant foam that was stuck in his hair, but he had to admit he kinda liked the attention. And he couldn't help but notice how since joining the Avengers, his life had gotten real strange real fast. 

The next time F.R.I.D.A.Y. called Scott down to the lab, there was no welding and no rollerskates. Tony had his clumsy robot fix Scott a coffee and when he spilled it all over Scott's shirt, it really wasn't subtle. Tony mopped Scott's chest with the shirt he'd just stripped off, which really just got more coffee on him, and he's pretty sure licking it off wasn't as effective as a shower would've been. When Tony kissed him afterwards, he tasted like it, and that was as near as Scott got to drinking a cup that night. Tony made him a fresh one in the morning when they finally emerged from his room; somehow it really didn't taste as good, but at least his clothes weren't soaked in it. Of course, by that point the clothes Scott was wearing were Tony's, so maybe dousing them in coffee would've served him right. 

And now F.R.I.D.A.Y. calls Scott down to the lab yet again and when he gets there, Tony grins as he looks up from the workbench. He's wearing boots and gloves that look a whole lot like they came from his suit, and there's another set waiting for Scott; he's pretty sure they're going to wreck the lab in the pursuit of something Tony's better at than skating, but sure, he'll try anything once. Probably twice, just to make sure. In a shocking twist that probably surprises no one, it turns out Tony Stark's a bad influence. 

Fifteen minutes later, the lab's still totally unscathed except for a single cup of coffee they've knocked onto the floor. Scott's still wondering how many Stark-branded mugs Tony gets through in the average year as they're making out mid-air. At least he is in the start; Tony's pretty distracting.

He'd like to think he could say no when Tony calls; he maybe could, but the fact is he doesn't really want to. He's having way too much fun for that.


End file.
